Need Help with Kindergarten......

he may be dysgraphic or dyslexic. The speech therapy specialist (if it's a public school) could evaluate him for free. If he goes to a private school, I believe the local public elementary would evaluate him for free too. My nephew had a similar struggle and was recently diagnosed as dysgraphic, now with a little extra help he's doing much better.

Good luck to you.

Have you tried using something physical to teach him the sounds? For example, my son has a puzzle of the alphabet and learned the sounds by holding, touching the letters and me telling him what they "say" - similar to how you teach animal sounds. I wouldn't worry as much about the names of the letters at first - but that can come through using something physical in combination with song. Also - I have heard that the video Letter Factory is excellent for teaching letters and sounds. Good luck!!

My 5 year old learned the sounds of the letters through a song. My oldest learned it when she was in kinder and would sing it all the time and her younger sister (then 3) would hear her singing it. Now my younger daughter is in kinder and has the same teacher and has picked up on that song very quickly. When she is asked the sounds of the letters, she just goes through the song if she gets stuck on one. You may have to look it up, but it is a great song and very simple... it starts A "ah" apple A "ah" apple B "buh" ball B "buh ball and it just goes through the whole alphabet. Sometimes she makes up her own words but she has the sounds down now. Good luck.

K.,

You may already do this, but perhaps focus on one or two letters at a time. Post them on the fridge, cut out magazine pictures that start with that letter, etc.

My daughter had a similar struggle. I broke out the penny jar we keep! We'd sit down together with a book of letters or a list of several sight words. Every time she got the letter sound/word correct, she'd earn 4 pennies. She loved it!!

Once we did this for a while, she would earn pennies for the correct ones, but had to give two pennies back if she gave an incorrect answer. (We'd cycle that letter/word back through the pile again for another chance!) Once she had earned $1 or so, we'd go to the store where she could buy a candy she wanted. It motivated her and she loved the fact she "earned her own money!"

Hope this helps!
Blessings,
M.

Could be developmental, could be dyslexia. My kindergartner had the same issue- she could "read" a LOT because she was a very good memorizer. Dyslexics are ABOVE average IQ -smarter than the average bear- so they learn LOTS of compensatory ways to get around what their brain has trouble with. But whether that is the issue or maybe he just isn't developmentally there-try the fun ways to learn. Sidewalk chalk- we used to do my daughter's spelling list on the driveway in chalk. Something with using large motor skills instead of fine ones to learn.... Soap crayons on the bathtub wall. Go outside and YELL the letters to words. Hide letters around the room and have him find the "A's. I did all of these things w/ my first two- the oldest boy just didn't seem interested but turned into a very high proficiency reader - but not until second grade-that can't do math to save his life. The second, girl, was dyslexic and I just KNEW she was starting in Kinder- but the schools wouldn't test her until second grade. Now she reads on level or above - but can't spell to save her life! She had trouble putting sounds to letters, also. None of the "classic" dyslexia issues- just doesn't "hear" (connect ) what sounds a letter makes. So when she started to spell vowels were totally interchangeable. (Lots of dyslexics will just leave the vowels out.) But, especially since he is a boy and they are typically a little slower on the verbal/written stuff developmentally- I wouldn't be too concerned. Just don't stress either one of you! Good luck!

Hi K., I used the Leapfrog dvds (Letter Factory & Word Factory) like many of the other moms here. Both my kids loved these movies, still do in fact. There is also a great toy by Leapfrog called Fridgephonics. It magnetically attaches to the fridge and all the letters are magnetic as well. When you put the letter on the unit it sings a little song about the sound the letter makes. My daughter learned her letters before she was 3 and the sounds by 4 with this and my son (who's 2 1/2) knows all his letters just from the dvd. Your son is probably fine and just needs some practice but if he gets frustrated just let him know we all had to learn it and that it's okay if he doesn't get it right away. Some kids are h*** o* themselves and need to know that it's okay if they don't get it the first time. There could be a learning disorder and you definitely should talk to your pediatrician if you're concerned but he may just need some practice. Goodluck!

YEA MOM! I'm so glad you have started asking questions early! The struggles your son has could be a warning sign for a common issue called dyslexia. 1 in 5 people have it! Go to www.brightsolutions.us and watch a free webcast: "Could it be Dyslexia?". It will take about 45 mins., but will answer many of your questions and yes, there are things you can be doing to make it easier. Be careful though, there are a lot folks trying to make a buck on "cures". Read the research for the best answers!
I'm a specialist in Midland and see many, many students each year. Email if you have ???'s. L.

I bought the LeapFrog Fridge Phonics Magnetic Letter Set for my son when he was 2 and now he is four and still plays with it. It helps because it's just like having magnetic letters on your fridge that kids play with anyway, but it comes with a little box that you put the letter into an it sounds of a little song naming the letter and the sounds it makes. I think it sells for about 20 dollars including the box and the 26 letters. Maybe this will help. Good luck!

I'd have him tested for dyslexia to make sure there's no underlying learning issue. You can call Scottish Rite Learning Center or Rawson-Saunders School for testing info.

When my 8 year old was in Kindergarten, his teacher was impressed he could read but not know letter sounds. She had been showing them the Letter Factory videos at school. We bought them (Target and Walmart have them). There is also a Letter Factory game.

I used the book "Teach Your Child To Read In 100 Easy Lessons" and it worked great for me. It establishes letters and the sounds they make first. Then it uses them in words to reinforce the sounds.

My son, who is a 1st grader now, is having the same issues. He may be able to read some words because he knows them now by memorization (i.e. sight words).

My mom, who taught for over 30 years, more than 20 in 1st grade, got out her training book on dyslexia. We have been concerned about dyslexia because my son's dad is dyslexic. However, he was never treated in school, that was before there was such a thing as dyslexia.

Anyway, there is a form of dyslexia where people have trouble recognizing letters and then further connecting the sound the letter makes to the letter itself.

My mom suggested contacting Scottish Rite to have him tested, but they don't take anyone until they are in 2nd grade. The school she taught it would not retain in kinder, but would in 1st. However, she said there were times she would pass a student on to 2nd even though they were not reading because they suspected dyslexia and the child had to be 2nd grade to be tested and get into the program.

We have been staying with my parents and my son attending a different school since Ike. My mom works with him every night and the school has him going to 2 different tutors, plus the teacher is helping one-on-one when she can. He has progressed so much it's unbelieveable. We're planning on staying at this school until Christmas break. One of his tutors told my mom this week that she thinks he'll be reading (by sounding out the words) by Christmas. He's a very, very smart boy, unbelieveable the things he knows about stuff that interests him. So it has been very perplexing and frustrating that he's not recognizing letters and connecting the sounds.

Good luck, try not to get too frustrated with him (I know how that can be), and just keep plugging away.

Have you had his vision checked?

There is a video called the letter factory, and it's amazing. I'm not sure what it is about this cartoon, but kindergartener's catch on VERY fast!

The Leap frog movie, "The Letter Factory and The Word Factory are the BEST. Both my children have learned within just a couple times of watching the movie.

I just thought I should support the other suggestions!

Good luck. BTW, you can purchase all of the leapfrog movie's at walmart, BUT they are in the TOY section, not the DVD section (at our walmart anyway!).

I think that you need to make the learning fun for him. Mabye some leap frog games, or v tech v smile. My 3 yr old loves her v smile and she is learning numbers, letters, etc at that young age because it makes it fun!! Sometimes little ones get frustrated and games makes it fun!!

Try flash cards, board games, that kind of thing!

Hope it helped!!

D.
http://www.formyrugrats.com

is teacher teaching phonics? A great website to teach sounds and early reading is www.starfall.com
Also have hearing checked by professional. Maybe he can not hear well enough to distinquish between sounds.

Hi K.,
Why don't you try www.starfall.com? This site is amazing! It will show you the letters and their sounds. Check out the site I love it. I have a speech delay child and he is doing wonderful he gets to pronounce after they do. Give the site a try and I hope it helps you.

Good luck,
Elisa

There is a great video by leap frog called the Letter Factory! My 4 and 5 yr olds come out singing the letters and their sounds because the video is so fun and teaches them in a fun and easy way!

Dear K., sounds like your son is really bright. Perhaps his info is just firing in a diff order in his brain. I'm NOT suggesting anything is wrong with him, only that perhaps a non conventional learning method would serve his abilities best. Would you consider a natural approach to checking him out? I have every confidence in my ND, a naturopathic dr., Your son would have no problem with the testing, which is non-invasive and no blood or scary anything. I love her, she is professional and her ofc feels not at all like a dr. ofc, but someone's home. They are a cheerful staff and kids of all ages are comfortable. She has a website with all FAQ. I would love to give you more info if you are interested. Peace, C.

I have a dvd by Leap Frog that teaches letters and sounds. My 3 year old watches it a lot and learned his letters and sounds before he turned 3. it's a great dvd and it captures their attention and makes it fun. They have another one after that especially for turning those letters into words. They are GREAT!

Since he can read some words (and many kindergarteners can't)I wouldn't worry about dyslexia quite yet. The districts I've worked in don't test for dyslexia until 2nd grade (after they are expected to read). Anyway, My mom was a kindergarten teacher and many of her kids didn't know their letters and sounds either. They had a letter of the week. Her students would then go home and cut out pictures from a magazine or whatever that start with the sound of the letter and glue them on a sheet of paper. Ex. c is the letter of the week so they would cut out car, castle, kitten/cat, key. Even though some of the words didn't start with c she would praise them and tell them that other letters sometimes make the same sound. She would bring in a snack (she didn't live in TX) that started with the sound also (ex. c--Captain Crunch, p--pretzels, etc.). This would be a fun way for you to work on it together. You may want to have the letter you're working on written big on a sheet of paper hanging on your fridge too. Good luck!

I love Starfall.com and so does my 7-year old, Ethan! My older son, Seth, used it in Kinder and 1st Grade. It is a really cute site and worth giving it a look. Best wishes!

get the leapfrog movie called Letter Factory and then even word factory.they are amazing educational movies and taught my son all his letters and sounds, and the word factory even taught him some blends.

K.:

Study after study show the best way to learn is through a phonics based system, not sight words. I would work with him a little at home and if you don't see any change, then have him tested. And, have you spoken with his teacher about your concerns? Maybe she feels he is on target, or perhaps could give you some insight.

That having been said, let me now get on my "Sight words are the worst thing EVER" soapbox. Ha Ha Your best bet is probably to make things fun for him. I taught my daughter to read with the book- available on line or at Barnes and Noble, Borders etc. called How to teach your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons. The idea is the child initially does not need to know it's called the letter "d", just that it makes the "duh" sound. Once they can put letter sounds together, they can form words. This is extremley helpful in spelling and sounding out words in the future. They have a solid foundation not a sight word foundation which you can only carry over to so many words. Just take a few minutes a day and try it. You can adjust it as you feel your child would like to . My daughter was reading in one week. Really reading, not sight word memorization, but sounding out. I remember going to Fiesta Texas and having her ask me what "that says" on the back of one of the rides. I laughed and told her she could read and she said "oh yeah". Stared at it and said "do not stand up on ride". That was after two weeks of 15 minute lessons a day. And she had never seen the word "stand" or "ride".

Sooooo, just try it and see how it works. There is nothing you can't teach your child at this age. Go for it!!!!!!!!!!!

Sometimes little guys need more time on this, but this said...I just came across some old flash cards that use a picture of something that produces a sound. Like a clock that ticks (t, t, t,) with the letter T t underneath it. Normally you'd see a clock for maybe "c," But it makes sense to put items that the child associates with the sound, because they probably aren't thinking, "c clock." M m has an ice cream cone because we say mmmm before we eat it. It seems to really be helping my first grader who struggled with certain sounds. I don't know that you could find them, I found them at a garage sale, but you might come up with your own sound/letter associations. The vowels were on blocks because their the building blocks of words. You get the idea. If you need the publisher to look on ebay or something, please let me know. I've also used Writing Road to Reading (Spalding Method) cards but they don't use picture associations just letters with all the sound variations each letter makes. Sometimes it takes awhile for a child to understand that a letter that is in one place makes the same sound and is the same as in a different place. Don't know why this is, but it is frustrating. One day (unless there is a learning disability and it is probably too early to tell) the light bulb goes on and they get it. Just keep reading together and develop that love of books as you work in these other areas, and it will fall into place. Enjoy!

www.starfall.com

they use it in my daughter's classroom and she love's to go on it at home.

Same here. Start slow, like with only one or two letters and praise him when he gets it right. Then add one and go over the other one too. He'll get it even if he isn't at the same level as the others. My son is improving and is on target developmentally. But, Kindergarten is pushing more and more on the kids - more then they can developmentally handle. Just be patient with him and give it to him piece meal. The teacher doesn't have time to do this and he is confused. It needs to be broken down until he understands what you're wanting him to do.

You might try the LeapFrog videos - the Letter Factory and the Talking Words factory. My daughter learned her letters and sounds so quickly just from watching the videos. Keep in mind that in kindergarten they go through the alphabet one letter at a time, so he may not have gotten all the way through the alphabet in class. My child becomes very frustrated if I work with her. I try to remember she has done quite a bit in school (and it is just preschool) and she doesn't want to do more at home. You may even ask the teacher if she has something you can use at home, coming from the teacher may make it more interesting to him. There is a board game from Leap Frog that focuses on the letters and sounds. My daughter loved this game too. Some of the video games work on these skills, too.
Good luck!

Your child may be a whole language learner....basically meaning he is not phonetic. This is not necessarily a bad thing, but he still needs to know his letters and sounds. There is a websites that kids really like called starfall.com. If you to the ABC section they can click on a block that has a letter and it has a book where they click on the letters and it makes the sound and puts it with words.

I would talk it over with his teacher and see what he thinks. He is only 5, and different children learn at different rates. My oldest son could not read well til halfway through 2nd grade, and he used to flip his letters in first. We were worried about dyslexia, but he had a wonderful 1st grade teacher that told us over and over that different children learn at different rates, and that my son was smart and would learn when he was ready. She cautioned us to keep an eye on him, but not to worry. After he started reading halfway through 2nd grade, he quickly became one of the most proficient readers, and consistently reads above grade level.

Sorry I'm late replying. Hope this can still help.

My son is in Kinder also (he's also in speech, but that was not related to my son learning or not learning his letters - he hated singing and refused to sing or even listen to the ABC song). The summer of 2007 I got him The Letter Factory dvd and, for Christmas 2007, The Word Whammer fridge toy with Capital Letters... see more about these below... (these were listed by a few other Moms) by LeapFrog. The Letter Factory does not teach the NAMES of the letters, just the SOUNDS, which he learned VERY quickly over the summer. I was concerned at the middle of the first grading period and mentioned this at his Parent-Teacher conference. Both his Kinder teacher AND his Speech teacher said that he was doing great and that it is harder to learn the sounds than the names, so he was actually doing better than they expected and for me not to worry. This was about 5 weeks ago and he now sings his ABCs ALL THE TIME *AND* knows the letter names at a glance. Don't worry so much about the sight reading, yet, since he is doing well in that area. He's really picked up playing with The Word Whammer since starting Kinder. He just did sounds with it until after Kinder started.

The Letter Factory dvd is a story about the Frog siblings Leap, Lily and Tad going to The Talking Letter Factory where Dad works. Tad is "too little" according to his older brother and sister to help with an ABC Sounds presentation since he doesn't know his Alphabet. He wanders off and during his adventure learns the sounds of the Alphabet in a fun, highly-effective way. My son, who wouldn't allow me to even play the ABC song from traditional children's cd's loves this dvd and can sit for hours watching this (forgive me, I really was worried he couldn't figure out his ABCs because he cried everytime he heard the song that sounds like Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star {odd since he loves Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star}, so I let him watch it over and over - he even knew how to use the dvd player already). It worked! He's right where he needs to be in class.

The Word Whammer fridge toy is a magnet and can be left on the fridge with all 32 letters {26 plus doubles of 6 letters like D, M, and a couple of others}. It teaches SOUNDS and NAMES and teaches three-letter word spelling. My son picked up ~ with help ~ MOM, DAD, and even JOHN very quickly and even figured out by himself that JON sounds the same. He figured out 'DVD' on his own, go figure.

It is really best for children to initially learn to sight read because that focuses on whole words that actually have meaning. Letters and sounds do not have meaning on their own. The letters and sounds can be learned later quite easily. I wouldn't worry about it.
He is not deficient in any way and may be frustrated at being expected to learn things that don't have any meaning.
Also don't forget that children need to learn at their own pace. The more we push them to learn at the rate that "everyone else is" or that people think they should learn, the less enjoyable the learning experience until by middle school, many kids are just doing it for the grades not for the learning itself.
By high school they are dropping out at a rate of 30% partly because the learning experiences they are having are so far removed from their interests and relevancy to their lives... it's sad really.
I think we have to change how we educate so that it is about people/children, not about a system that was originally started to produce factory workers. That is what public schools were designed for,hence the bells and so forth. The problem is that our country's industrial base has changed completely since then and what is needed is not a group of people with a set database of knowledge, but a group who can innovate and be creative. Stephen Covey's new book, "The Leader In Me" stares very clearly that employers are frustrated beyond belief at the lack of innovation, and creativity in the current work pool. Graduates have diplomas, but don't know how to manage time. They have high grades, but do not problem solve well or think well critically.
The game has changed, but the approach to education hasn't. Factory workers needed basic skills like reading and basic math. Those are still the emphasis in the public schools and most traditional schools. The problem is the modern economy needs right brain skills now.
So anyway I'd say relax. Your child is learning to read. Dob't stress him out by forcing something he may not be interested/ready for now. Also please remember every child is different and they need our support in understanding that they will "get it", in their own time.
Blessings,
Z.

I got a couple videos for my son when he was 2. Leap Frog Letter Factory and LeapFrog Word Factory. Both are Phonetically based. One goes through and teaches the letters and sounds of them along with a catchy tune. The other uses what you learned in the first video and then expands on it to teach you how to build words with the "word wammer".
My son learned his entire alphabet and their sounds by 2 1/2 years and my daughter (younger) watched this growing up and actually knew all her alphabets by 18 months.
I cannot say enough about these videos. I have suggested them to several of my family and friends and they have all benefited from these videos too. I hope you do!!

Your son may be a bit too old for it now, but I found some videos when my son was a baby that he really loved. They were from "Brainy Baby". One was about the ABCs and helped him learn all the sounds each letter could make and included several songs to reinforce what he was learning and make it fun. He knew the alphabet AND all the sounds by the time he was three just from watching this video.

I found a copy pretty cheap at:
http://www.brainybaby.com/shop/html/Products/Videos/ABCs-...

May be worth a try...the age range is 2 to 5. ...and they have other great videos on that site (e.g., 123s). My son is in second grade now and looking back, those videos were the best money I ever spent to help him develop a foundation for learning...I passed them on to a friend who is reporting similar results.